Doublespeak means "evasive, ambiguous or high flown language intended to deceive or confuse. Malicious doublespeak is meant to shock or horrify." It is disgraceful, immoral, defaming, and is meant to damage a person or group's reputation. Propaganda is a form of "Gaslighting", wherein information and ideas are methodically spread to promote or injure a cause, movement, nation, etc. It is a deliberate spreading of information while leaving out the real facts and surrounding the statements with unresolved answers and questionable statements. Indeed, bald-face lies are very injurious to people.

I found Professor E. Scott Cracraft letter ... a misplacement of the facts and a doublespeak process. The haughty contempt for or against a person on the basis of the group or class to which the person belongs rather than according to merit shows partiality. To discriminate against a group of people who love their country is appalling and shows the writer's disdain for Americans who love the Constitution. Racial discrimination, which is prejudice coming from a community college professor, is unacceptable and dauntingly disheartening. My husband who was a scholar in American and world history would be astounded at this man's gridlock ... (conversation jam), manipulation and torsion of words. I wonder what is going on in the classroom? Are our cherished high school graduates hearing the truth? To doublespeak is to misinform and deceive students/parents and citizens.

I find numerous derogatory statements. "Fascism is a very specific type of right-wing-socio-political movement." What wild malicious talk. Where did he find this information? Is it fact or fiction? Where is the proof? A spreading of propaganda perhaps? Lets pick an untruth and run with it! Sound familiar?

Another statement ... "even moderate Republican parties often possess certain characteristics that may make them the closest thing we have seen to an American fascist movement in decades." Another "Big bald-face lie" to discredit a group. I would ask the professor to go to the dictionary and find the real meaning of fascism ... which is the absolute control of everyone and everything, and if he desires, ponder what has happened to our country for the last six years. There lies the real truth. Communism is a political doctrine or movement based on Marxism and developed by Lenin and others, seeking a violent overthrow of capitalism and the creation of a classless society in which all economic and social activity is controlled by a totalitarian state dominated by a single and self-perpetuating political party. Fascism is top-down control of people.

Middle-class and working people are not afraid, disaffected and insecure, as stated by Mr. Cracraft. Most middle-class people want life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. They want a government of, by and for the people. Mr. Cracraft is right about the "big lies" because his outrageous remarks are very inflammatory to our Live Free, Die Free State and to We the People.

Let me educate Professor Cracraft. There are "death panels" in Obamacare! A book that details the deceptions of Obamacare is by Betsey McCaughey, Ph.D., a constitutional scholar and patient advocate, the name is "Beating Obamacare." People have already died. A lady in Oregon with lung cancer was denied care and chemo drugs because of her age and the monies involved, she eventually died. Just look at our veterans and how they were denied care and MD appointments for months. Eventually they died. Imagine, disowning care to our most illustrious soldiers and veterans.

Mr. Cracraft, your eyes are wide shut. Sarah Palin is not incompetent. Her predictions were true. At least she had the vision and intelligence to see the real effect of this assault against the American people. Will you face this dilemma?

Who told you the Tea Party was arming itself? Another propaganda pitch? I think so. Let's start a rumor and run with it. It is unprofessional to label people. I would never let any of my children or grandchildren be in Professor Cracraft's classroom.

I saw some ducks in the lake the other day, fishing, swimming and enjoying their freedom.

Peggy Graham wrote a very simple and reasonable reply to Scott Cracraft's vile attack on the Tea Party. Bet a coffee and doughnut Scott won't even consider attending a TP meeting to see the truth for himself.

The elite, true believers, have to invent excuses for the failures and faults of their fallible demigods like Obama who live by the "any means justifies the end" credo. They find our Constitution, our laws just to inconvenient to live by and sense they can't convince a majority to change them. They, in frustration, resort to call names like children do all the while calling for civil debate.

So Scott, go to a TP meeting if you dare so you will have some idea of what your talking about.

In her new book, "A History of the Belknap Mill", Carol Anderson details the story of the way in which the Belknap Mill developed to produce quality products. She takes us inside the minds of those who developed and perfected the machinery used to make hosiery. As a result of her research, she reveals a story of the people of the area, the way in which they came together to work toward perfecting the intricacies of knitting socks, and the pride they had in doing so.

As happened with many of the other mills in the area, when the Belknap Mill was no longer needed to produce a product, some people wanted to tear down everything from that era. But community members came together to fight against many setbacks to preserve the Belknap Mill and create a museum to help maintain an appreciation of the accomplishments of the citizens of Laconia.

Everyone in the city should show their pride in those who came before them by becoming involved today in keeping this museum open and thriving. In addition, this book should also be mandatory reading for all high school students in the Lakes Region.

A recent writer to The Sun wrote that Jesus was not "pluralistic" and that our government is "antagonistic to religious freedom". Whether Jesus was pluralistic or not I do not know, but I do know that the U.S. Constitution permits and even encourages religious pluralism. It also guarantees separation of church and state and religious neutrality. Every American knows that the U.S. Constitution grants us "Freedom of Religion." But, a closer look at the Constitution reveals that we actually enjoy three separate religious liberties: No "religious test," no government "establishment" of religion, and "free exercise" of religion.

The first of these is in the Body ("Articles") of the U.S. Constitution where it reads that there can be "no religious test" for holding public office. I remember photo-shopped pictures of Obama swearing his oath as senator on a copy of the Quran. Although these were faked, it would not have mattered. As long as someone is legally elected it does not matter what their religion — or lack thereof — happens to be. We have had a number of American Muslims elected to office who took their oaths on a Quran instead of a Bible. It is their sacred text. One such Muslim took his oath on a Quran from the library of Founder Thomas Jefferson.

The second and third liberties we enjoy regarding religion are contained in the First Amendment. Government cannot make laws "regarding an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." In other words, the Constitution is neutral on matters of faith while allowing the most religious freedom in the "democratic world."

We do not have established churches, but we do allow churches a high degree of freedom and even let them avoid taxation. This tax-exempt status is even granted to religious bodies whose motives may be questionable to many. How is that a "war on religion?"

The "free exercise" clause is very broad. The only real limitation is interfering with another's rights.

Some Christian conservatives blame liberals, the U.S. Supreme Court, the ACLU, or whatever for "removing God from our public schools." As though anyone, even a liberal, had that power.

Actually, many misunderstand what the courts have actually ruled on this matter. Granted, you cannot have prayer or other religious exercises sponsored by a school or its staff. But, students are still free to pray or read religious literature on their own time and many do. Of course, a teacher can ask a student to close the Bible during class and open up the math book. Teachers are allowed to teach about religion or even have a class in the Bible as a work of literature, but they cannot preach or impose a particular religious view on their students.

As far as schools teaching the biblical creation story in public schools, there is no problem as long as it is taught in a mythology or humanities class and not in biology or geology courses.

Parents who wish to give their child a religious education are still free to teach them at home, send them to Sunday school, and even to educate them at home or in a religious school. Our laws regarding this right are much more liberal than in some European democracies. The taxpayers, however, cannot be asked to pay for such religious education.

Our founders in no way founded a "Christian republic" based on "biblical" law. Of course, they wanted a free but orderly and law-abiding society, but the Judeo-Christian tradition does not possess a monopoly on such values. True, most of the founders had some connection to some Protestant denomination as did most Americans at the time and some were indeed Christians.

Many others however, cannot be considered "Christians" in the traditional sense of that term. Some, like Founders Thomas Jefferson and Ben Franklin were deists, a commonly-held view in 18th-century Enlightenment philosophy which influenced our founders much more than Christianity. Deists held that God created the universe but that humans make their own destinies without God constantly intervening in human history. Deists also denied the divinity of Jesus, a belief central to Christianity.

Actually, in spite of some recent letters to The Sun that imply that those who think as I do are anti-religious, I actually take the same position regarding religion as most of our Founders: If your religion makes you a better person, citizen, or neighbor, then your religion is a positive thing. But, if your religion inspires you to bomb an abortion clinic, fly planes into buildings, or to otherwise interfere with the rights of others, then it is probably a very negative thing.

Finally, another alarm I often hear from conservatives is that there is a "war on Christmas." Are you serious? Do you really think corporate consumer capitalism would allow that?

This year's Thanksgiving will be long remembered by many of us, I'm sure. After losing power late Wednesday afternoon, I was one of the three people in the Laconia Middle School Shelter from Thanksgiving evening to Friday afternoon, when my power was restored.

I am truly grateful to the CERT volunteers for their kind and cheerful welcome, as well as companionship. My cat, Galileo, and I were very thankful to sleep in a warm environment after experiencing a cold Wednesday night. All of that trumps a turkey dinner any day.

On Thanksgiving Day, I went to the Gilford Police Station to inquire about a shelter and was very kindly referred to the Gilford Fire Department. There, Tim Johnson, a very nice young firefighter took my information and later called me to let me know about the Laconia Middle School Shelter.

Many thanks to both the police and fire departments. Without their help, I would not have learned of the opening of the shelter. God Bless all of you who made the experience a pleasant one.

Perhaps notification, before the storm occurs, of what to do and whom to contact would be helpful to others in a similar situation. This could be done via radio, TV and newspapers. I'm sure there were many other people out there who could have benefited from the care that I personally received.

Again, many thanks to those "angels" who were there, when I was in need.